Eleanor Roosevelt

EARLY LIFE

Anna Eleanor Roosevelt was born on October 11, 1884 at 56 West 37th Street, New York City, New York.

She was born into one of richest and most influential families in New York Her father was Elliott Roosevelt the brother of Theodore Roosevelt (who later became the 26th president of the United States), and her mother Anna Hall Roosevelt.

She was a favorite niece of Theodore Roosevelt.

Eleanor's father, Elliott Roosevelt, doted on his daughter and called her "Little Nell," after the character in Charles Dickens' The Old Curiosity Shop . Unfortunately, Elliott suffered from a growing addiction to alcohol and drugs, which ultimately destroyed him and his family.

In 1890, when Eleanor was about six years old, Elliott separated from his family and began receiving treatments in Europe for his alcoholism. At the behest of his brother, Theodore Roosevelt, Elliott was exiled from his family until he could free himself from his addictions.

Anna Hall Roosevelt, was considered a great beauty; while Eleanor herself was definitely not, a fact Eleanor knew greatly disappointed her mother.

In 1892, Anna went to the hospital for a surgery and afterwards contracted diphtheria; she died soon after, when Eleanor was just eight years old.

Just months later, Eleanor's two younger brothers came down with scarlet fever. Baby Hall survived, but 4-year-old Elliott Jr. developed diphtheria and died in 1893.

With the deaths of her mother and young brother, Eleanor hoped that she would be able to spend more time with her beloved father. Not so. Elliott's addictions got worse after the deaths of his wife and child and confined to a sanitarium, he died on August 14, 1894 after jumping from a window during a fit of delirium tremens. He survived the fall but died from a seizure.

Eleanor was just ten years old and an orphan. Eleanor and her brother Hall went to live with their very strict maternal grandmother, Mary Hall, in Manhattan.

Eleanor's childhood losses left her prone to depression throughout her life.

Eleanor spent time in a girls’ boarding school at Allenswood, outside London between 1899 to 1902. Mademoiselle Marie Souvestre was her headmistress. Later Eleanor would recall that Souvestre was one of the three main persons to influence her life.

Eleanor doted on her younger brother Hall, and when he enrolled at Groton School in 1907, she accompanied him as a chaperone.

Most of her mother’s family members tended to look down at Eleanor, perhaps because of her plain looks and six-foot tall frame.

RELATIONSHIP WITH FRANKLIN ROOSEVELT

In 1902 Eleanor was formally introduced to her future husband Franklin Roosevelt on a train to Tivoli, New York when he was a Harvard student. (They had previously met as children, but this was their first serious encounter.)

Eleanor was a fifth-cousin, once removed of Franklin Roosevelt.

They were married on March 17, 1905, in a wedding officiated by Endicott Peabody, the groom's headmaster at Groton School.

The newly-wed Eleanor and Franklin moved into a house bought for them by Franklin's controlling mother, Sara who became a frequent house-guest, much to Eleanor's mortification.

Eleanor was painfully shy and hated social life, and at first she desired nothing more than to stay at home and raise Franklin's children, of which they had six in rapid succession: Anna (1906–75), James (1907–91), Franklin Jr (March to November 1909), Elliott (1910–90), a second Franklin Jr. (1914–88), and John (1916–81).

Eleanor and Franklin with their first two children, 1908

Franklin Roosevelt was a charismatic, handsome and socially active man, while Eleanor was shy and retiring, and furthermore was almost constantly pregnant during the decade after 1906.

Roosevelt soon found sexual outlets outside his marriage. One of these was Eleanor's social secretary Lucy Mercer, with whom Roosevelt began an affair soon after she was hired in early 1914.

In September 1918 Eleanor found letters in one of Franklin's suits which revealed the affair. Eleanor was mortified and confronted him with the correspondence, demanding a divorce. Sara Roosevelt argued that a divorce would ruin Roosevelt's political career, and pointed out that Eleanor would have to raise five children on her own if she divorced him. Since Sara was financially supporting the Roosevelts, this was a strong incentive to preserve the marriage.

A deal was struck. The facade of the marriage would be preserved, but sexual relations would cease. Sara would pay for a separate home at Hyde Park for Eleanor, and she would also fund Eleanor's philanthropic interests. Eleanor accepted these terms, and in time Franklin and Eleanor developed a new relationship as friends and political colleagues, while living separate lives. Franklin continued to see various women, including his secretary Missy LeHand.

Eleanor and Franklin Roosevelt in August 1932

PUBLIC LIFE 

In August 1921, while the Roosevelts were vacationing at Campobello Island, New Brunswick, Franklin Roosevelt was stricken with polio. The result was total and permanent paralysis from the waist down and Eleanor Roosevelt began giving speeches and appearing at campaign events in her husband's place.

When Franklin became president, Eleanor did a lot of his travelling and visiting for her husband. In 1933-34 she averaged 40,000 miles a year.

Eleanor Roosevelt was a civil rights activist with a puritan ethic winning the votes of the black population who since Lincoln's time had voted Republican.

She was one of the first post suffragette feminists, who campaigned against fascism in Spain and Germany and was involved with every progressive issue of the time back home (League of Women Voters, Women’s Trade Union League, Birth Control League).

FIRST LADY

Eleanor became First Lady of the United States when Franklin Roosevelt was inaugurated on March 4, 1933.

Roosevelt in 1932

Eleanor Roosevelt was the longest-serving First Lady of the U.S.

The tall, regal first lady was the first presidential spouse to hold regular press conferences and in 1940 became the first to speak at a national party convention.

Eleanor Roosevelt wrote a daily popular column, "My Day", that featured in scores of newspapers, another first for a presidential spouse. She was also the first First Lady to write a monthly magazine column and to host a weekly radio show.

She appeared in adverts for mattresses and hot dog buns and air travel during her years in the White House.

Eleanor Roosevelt gave a $35,000 fee for a margarine ad to charity and was inundated with letters after it aired. "The mail was evenly divided," she said. "One half was sad because I had damaged my reputation. The other half was happy because I had damaged my reputation."

Hot dogs gained an international reputation when the Roosevelts served hot dogs to King George VI and Queen Elizabeth on their 1939 American tour.

PERSONAL LIFE 

Eleanor Roosevelt ate three chocolate covered garlic balls every morning. Her doctor prescribed this diet to improve her memory.

Eleanor Roosevelt regularly refused Secret Service protection, and instead traveled with a .22 Smith and Wesson on her person.

Her final home was at 55 East 74th Street on the Upper East Side in New York City.

Eleanor Roosevelt and Amelia Earhart were very close friends. One time, they sneaked out of the White House to go to a party together. After flying with Earhart, Roosevelt obtained a student’s permit to fly, though didn't pursue this further since her husband didn't want her to be a pilot.

First Ladies Eleanor Roosevelt and Jackie Kennedy both lived on East 74th Street .

Fala (April 7, 1940 – April 5, 1952), a Scottish Terrier, was the dog of Franklin and Eleanor during their time in the White House. One of the most famous presidential pets, Fala's antics were widely covered in the media and often referenced by the Roosevelts.

Fala was so well known to Americans during his presidency that American soldiers during the Battle of the Bulge would ask each other what the president's dog was named in order to prove that they weren't Germans in disguise.

Roosevelt with her dog Fala in 1951

YEARS AFTER THE WHITE HOUSE 

Franklin Roosevelt died on April 12, 1945 after suffering a cerebral hemorrhage at the Little White House in Warm Springs, Georgia. Eleanor later learned that her husband's mistress Lucy Mercer Rutherfurd had been with him when he passed away.

After the death of her husband in 1945, she started her career, as an author, speaker and spokesperson for human rights.

In December 1945, President Harry S. Truman appointed Eleanor as a delegate to the United Nations General Assembly. In January 1947 she was appointed chairperson of United Nations Commission on Human Rights. Along with René Cassin, John Peters Humphrey and others, she played an instrumental role in drafting the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR).

Roosevelt speaking at the United Nations in July 1947.

Former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt wrote 27 books, including an advice tome for American ladies called It’s Up to the Women.

DEATH AND LEGACY 

Eleanor Roosevelt was diagnosed with aplastic anemia soon after being struck by a motor vehicle in New York City in April 1960.

In 1962, she was given steroids, which activated a dormant case of tuberculosis in her bone marrow,and she died of resulting cardiac failure at her Manhattan home at 55 East 74th Street on November 7, 1962, at the age of 78.

Simon and Garfunkel's "Mrs Robinson" was originally called "Mrs Roosevelt," after Eleanor Roosevelt. It became "Mrs Robinson" when it was considered for use in the movie The Graduate.

President Harry S. Truman called Eleanor Roosevelt the First Lady of the World, in honor of her many travels to help promote human rights.

Portrait of Roosevelt purchased by the White House

Sources Food For Thought by Ed Pearce, Daily Mail, ThoughtCo

Jacqueline Kennedy

EARLY LIFE

Jacqueline Lee Bouvier was born on July 28, 1929 in Southampton, New York to Wall Street stockbroker John Vernou "Black Jack" Bouvier III (1891–1957) and Janet Norton Lee (1907–1989).

Her early years were spent in New York City and East Hampton, Long Island, at the Bouvier family estate called "Lasata".

Starting at a young age, Jackie was a talented equestrienne. At just 3-years-old, she was already able to control her pony.

Six-year-old Bouvier in 1935

Jackie's parents divorced in 1940, and her mother married Standard Oil heir Hugh D. Auchincloss in 1942. Jackie and her younger sister, Lee, moved in with their mother's new family, and divided their time between their stepfather's two vast estates: Merrywood in McLean, Virginia, and Hammersmith Farm in Newport, Rhode Island.

In 1941, a 12-year-old Jackie toured the White House with her mother and sister, but she found it extremely frustrating that there was so little information offered to visitors. So when Jackie eventually moved into the White House herself, she made it her mission to fix this.

Jackie once wrote in her school yearbook that her ambition in life was "not to be a housewife."

In 1951, the 22-year-old Jackie submitted an essay to a Vogue writing contest, where the winner would earn a junior editor position for six months in New York and six months in Paris. And out of 1,279 entries, Jackie's essay won the contest. However, she quit on her first morning as a junior editor.

Before she started a relationship with John F. Kennedy, Jackie was engaged at the age of 22 to a Wall Street banker named John Husted. She broke it off after three months in 1952, because she reportedly thought he was dull and also was hesitant about becoming a housewife.

MARRIAGE TO JFK

Jacqueline Bouvier and then congressman John F. Kennedy were introduced by a mutual friend at a dinner party in May 1952. Kennedy was then busy running for the US Senate, but after his election in November, the relationship grew more serious and led to a proposal.

The wedding of Jacqueline and John F. Kennedy took place on September 12, 1953, at St Mary's Church, in Newport, Rhode Island. It was considered the social event of the season with an estimated 800 guests at the ceremony and 1000 at the lavish reception that followed at Hammersmith Farm.

Senator John F. Kennedy and Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy on their wedding day, September 12, 1953

Jacqueline Kennedy suffered a miscarriage in 1955, and gave birth to a stillborn baby girl in 1956.
The couple eventually became parents to a daughter Caroline (b. 1957) and a son John (1960-1999). A second son, Patrick, was born prematurely in August 1963 and died two days later.

Jacqueline Kennedy was multilingual. She mastered French and speaking also some German and Italia as well as Spanish fluently. She taped radio ads in French, Italian and Spanish, urging the listeners to vote for her husband.

When John Kennedy became the president of the United States on January 20, 1961, Jacqueline Kennedy became, at age 31, one of the youngest First Ladies in American history.

First Lady Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy, President John F. Kennedy, André Malraux, Marie-Madeleine Lioux Malraux, Lyndon B. Johnson and Lady Bird Johnson having just descended White House Grand Staircase on their way to a dinner with the French cultural minister, April 1962

After moving into the White House, Jacqueline Kennedy was dismayed at the state the official residence was in. She established a Fine Arts Committee to help her restore the house to its original splendor with American furniture and paintings of historical significance. She hosted a televised tour of the White House, on February 14, 1962, to show the progress of the work. Jackie's televised White House tour exposed millions to the ins and outs of her restoration project, eventually earning her an Emmy.

Charles Collingwood with Jacqueline Kennedy on TV tour of the White House, 14 Feb 1962.

On August 7, 1963, Jacqueline Kennedy prematurely gave birth to a boy, Patrick Bouvier  Kennedy, who died two days later of respiratory distress syndrome.

She was seated next to President Kennedy in an open limousine, when on November 22, 1963, he was shot in the head by a sniper in Dallas. The courage and dignity Jackie displayed in the aftermath of that tragedy won her international admiration.

FASHION

Already stylish and graceful even as a teenager, in 1948 Jackie was dubbed "Debutante of the Year" by Hearst columnist Igor Cassini.

In the early 1960s Jacqueline Kennedy was largely responsible for popularizing the bouffant coiffure.

Her clean suits with a skirt hem down to middle of the knee, three-quarter sleeves on notch-collar jackets, sleeveless A-line dresses, above-the-elbow gloves and famous pillbox hats became known as the "Jackie" look.

Jacqueline Kennedy at a State dinner on May 22, 1962

After her husband's assassination, Jackie refused to change out of her bloodstained bright pink suit
at Lyndon B. Johnson's swearing in, Jackie declined Lady Bird Johnson's offer of a change of clothes with a heartbreaking statement: "Oh no, I want them to see what they've done to Jack." The outfit would go on to be one of the most famous artifacts from the day her husband was assassinated.

Jackie's iconic pink suit was actually a copy of a Chanel outfit. Chez Ninon, a New York fashion salon, created a line-for-line reproduction of Chanel's design so Jackie could skirt around the ban on wearing foreign designers — a habit that she had been publicly criticized for in the past.

Not only did Jackie speak Spanish and French, she was also proficient in Italian and Polish.

Jackie Kennedy liked lunch to have less than 500 calories. It often consisted of a baked potato with a spoonful of fresh caviar.plus a glass or two of champagne.

LATER LIFE AND DEATH 

President John F Kennedy ordered one of his top Secret Service agents to make sure that Jackie did not meet her friend Aristotle Onassis on a trip she took to Greece in 1961.

After leaving the White House, Jacqueline Kennedy lived for a time in Georgetown, Washington, D.C., but moved to New York City with her children in late 1964.

Eight years after John F Kennedy’s assassination, Jacqueline Kennedy avoided the public unveiling of their White House portraits, but the Nixons graciously agreed to a secret, private tour for her and her children. It was her only return visit.

On October 20, 1968, Jackie married her long-time friend Aristotle Onassis, a wealthy Greek shipping magnate. The wedding took place on Skorpios, Onassis's private Greek island in the Ionian Sea.

After Onassis' death in 1975, Jackie once more settled in New York City. From 1978 to 1994, the former First Lady worked as a book editor for Doubleday, an American publishing company. While there, she worked on several JFK biographies.

in 1988 Jackie Onassis edited Michael Jackson's 1988 autobiography Moon Walk. 

Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis died of cancer (lymphoma) on May 19, 1994 at her home in New York City, at the age of 64. She was buried at Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia, next to President Kennedy, their stillborn daughter and infant son.

Source Good Housekeeping

Hillary Clinton

Hillary Clinton was born October 26, 1947 at Edgewater Hospital in Chicago. She was raised in Park Ridge, a suburb located 15 miles northwest of downtown Chicago. Her parents were Hugh E. Rodham and Dorothy Emma Howell Rodham and she grew up with two younger brothers, Hugh and Tony.

Hillary Clinton's great-grandfather, Jonathan Rodham, was a coal miner in north-east England.

Clinton claimed her mother was inspired to name her Hillary with two ‘l’s by the first person to climb Everest, until it was pointed out that she was born in 1947 and Sir Edmund Hillary didn’t conquer the peak until 1953.

Hillary Clinton wanted to be an astronaut as a child. She wrote to NASA, but was told its program didn’t accept women.

Hillary Clinton attended Maine East school from 1961–1964. She was elected president of the school’s Young Republicans chapter before she ultimately switched to Democrat.

The actor Harrison Ford graduated from Maine East school, the year before Hillary Clinton enrolled.

She entered Yale Law School in 1969 and received a Juris Doctor (J.D.) degree four years later.

In 1974, Clinton was one of three women on the staff of 43 lawyers who advised the House committee during the Watergate scandal. Their work led to Richard Nixon’s eventual resignation.

Hillary and Bill Clinton first met when they were classmates at the Yale Law School. They married on October 11, 1975 in the living room of their new home in Fayetteville, Arkansas, when Hillary was working as a faculty member at the Law School of the University of Arkansas. When asked what attracted Hillary to Bill, she replied, “He wasn’t afraid of me.”

In 1993  Hillary Clinton chaired a commission, which produced a complicated scheme for radically reforming America’s health care. She was forced to abandon her plans to introduce a national health insurance scheme enabling medical care to be affordable to all, due to the vehement opposition of lobby groups representing doctors, insurance companies and health care. Despite the set back, the First Lady continued to be a leading light in raising public awareness of health issues especially stressing the importance that children are properly immunized and promoting breast cancer research funding.

According to An Invitation To The White House" Hillary Clinton's favorite dish prepared by former presidential pastry chef Roland Mesnier was mocha mousse cake. She wrote: "When it appears, and then quickly disappears, I'll call Roland laughing and pleading, 'Please don't ever do it again!'"

When Hillary Clinton decided that she wanted to be a Senator, she chose New York even though she never lived there. She went on to win the election on November 7, 2000, becoming the first First Lady in US history to seek and win a political office.

She was re-elected to the Senate in 2006.

Hillary Clinton loves going on long walks with her husband and two dogs, Maisie and Tally. They were on one of those walks when President Obama called to ask her to be his secretary of state.

Clinton was the 67th secretary of state from 2009 to 2013. During her term as Secretary of State in Barack Obama's administration, Clinton used her position to make women's rights and human rights a focus of U.S. initiatives.

Official portrait of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

As Secretary of State,  Clinton went to 112 countries and flew 956,733 miles.

On July 26, 2016, Hillary Clinton became the first female Presidential nominee of a major US party at the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia. Despite winning a plurality of the national popular vote, Clinton lost the Electoral College and the presidency to her Republican opponent Donald Trump.

Hillary Clinton won a Grammy in 1997 for Best Spoken Word Album for the audio version of her book It Takes a Village.

Hillary Clinton's 2014 memoir Hard Choices is so titled because that is how she frames the foreign policy situations encountered during her tenure.

Spicy food fan Hillary Clinton always carries in her handbag some chili flakes and a bottle of Tabasco sauce, to pep up her meals.

Hillary Clinton revealed in 2014 that she hasn't driven a car in 20 years.

She likes to relax by reading mystery novels.

Abigail Adams

Abigail Adams was born on November 22, 1744 in Weymouth, Massachusetts to Elizabeth and Reverend William Smith, a Congregationalist minister.

Abigail Adams

Through her mother, Elizabeth Quincy (1721–75), Abigail was descended from the 17th-century Puritan preacher Thomas Shepard (1605–49) of Cambridge.

Abigail was frequently sick as a child and did not receive formal schooling. However her mother taught Abigail and her older sisters Mary and Elizabeth (known as Betsy) to read, write and cipher.

Abigail's father's, uncle's and grandfather's large libraries enabled her to study English and French literature. Over time, she would become a voracious bibliophile.

Abigail Smith first met newly qualified country lawyer John Adams when she was 15 years old in 1759. Although Adams' congregational minister father approved of the match, her mother was enraged that she was wedding someone she considered beneath her daughter.

The couple married on October 25, 1764, in the Smiths' home in Weymouth. Abigail's father presided over the ceremony. After the reception, the couple mounted a single horse and rode off to their new home, the small cottage and farm John had inherited from his father in Braintree, Massachusetts.

John Adams – 1766 Portrait by Blyth

She had six children: Nabby, John Quincy, Susanna, Charles, Thomas, and Elizabeth.

During the American Revolution, Abigail kept the family farm from ruin as war raged around her. she contributed to the cause by housing the local militia and even melted down her precious pewter spoons into musket balls.

John Adams was sworn in as the second President of the United States in Philadelphia on March 4, 1797. When President Adams was sworn in his mother was dying in Massachusetts. A particularly brutal New England winter kept Abigail away from Philadelphia and she missed her husband's inauguration.

During most of his administration, John Adams lived at the Presidential mansion in Philadelphia. Located at the intersection of 6th and Market Streets, it served as the headquarters of the government’s executive branch until May 1800.

John and Abigail Adams and their family were the first residents of the White House. At the time, their new mansion was—to the First Lady’s chagrin—still under construction. Only six rooms were finished when they arrived on November 1, 1800. (Between the two dates, the President stayed at a local tavern). Abigail wrote: "The house is on a grand and superb scale, requiring about 30 servants. . . . [T]he fires we are obliged [to have] to secure us from daily agues . . . if they let me have wood enough to keep the fires. . . . [T]he great unfurnished audience room [East Room] I make a drying room of to hang up the clothes in."

During and after the American Revolution Abigail was separated for long periods of time from her husband, who was first a delegate to Congress and later a diplomat in Europe. During John Adams presidency, he spent prolonged periods away from his beloved wife. Through it all, the couple diligently wrote each other. Abigail's letters to him present a vivid picture of the time. Their discourse includes eyewitness accounts of the vote for independence, Washington’s inauguration, and countless other moments that helped shape their young nation.

Abigail opposed slavery and supported women's rights. In 1776, her husband participated in the First Continental Congress in Philadelphia. There, Adams wrote her most famous letter to the Founding Fathers requesting that they, "remember the ladies."

The Familiar Letters of John Adams and His Wife, Abigail (2 vol., 1876), published with a memoir by their grandson, Charles Francis Adams, and later collections of her letters show that she was perceptive, erudite and warmhearted.

After John Adams' defeat in his presidential re-election campaign, the family retired to Quincy, Massachusetts, in 1800. Abigail followed her son John Quincy's political career earnestly. In 1825 he became the sixth President of the United States.

Abigail Adams in later life by Gilbert Stuart

Abigail Adams died on October 28, 1818 of typhoid fever. Her last words were, "Do not grieve, my friend, my dearest friend. I am ready to go. And John, it will not be long."

She is buried beside her husband in a crypt located in the United First Parish Church (also known as the Church of the Presidents) in Quincy.